Step Up, Stand Out or Sit Down

I just submitted a proposal to a company that they hire me for a job that I suggested they create for me. I had heard of people writing their own job descriptions, but I honestly never really thought of myself as being one of those people. Granted, writing up something and having the "powers that be" accept it are two very different things.

But the exercise is important: Stepping up to something, giving a little push and seeing if the ball will roll. This is a huge part of media production. We all start with almost nothing (maybe a script and a few pieces of equipment at most) and then we try to get a bunch of people to join up. At any point in the process the whole thing could tank if just one or two key people said, "Um, no thanks. Not interested."

That happened the day before shooting was supposed to begin on one of our larger projects back in the day. We'd spent months on pre-production and I got to call the actors who were already driving over for the shoot and tell them they could go back home. That was not one of the more enjoyable days of filmmaking.

It's also important to stand out, to be good at what you do. I don't mean that you need to be radically different from everyone else, or spend more money, or tackle different subjects, you just need to be good. A comment on ERL pointed out that Marvel has made the two top grossing, non-sequel films ever ...that's not only impressive--shall we say, "Marvelous"... I know, I know--it makes them stand out.


Okay, this post is getting long. Too much text, not enough pretty pictures. So, for whatever reason, I felt that a deviation from my high school's slogan would be appropriate:


A Step to the Side

~Luke Holzmann
Your Media Production Mentor